Once The Most Successful Franchise In Pro Basketball And One Of The Elite Names In All Of Professional Sports, The Boston Celtics Have Hit Rock Bottom.

The Mighty Fall Hard

January 09, 2001|By Sam Smith, Tribune Pro Basketball Writer.

Rick Pitino resigned Monday. This is not news. Guys like Rick Pitino always resign--to go to something better, something different, something more lucrative, something to keep their name before the public.

There was just one loser this time as Pitino quit after about 3 1/2 seasons as coach and president of the Boston Celtics. The loser was the Celtics, once the most successful franchise in pro basketball and one of the elite names in professional sports.

Yankees, Packers, Canadiens, Celtics. These have been the franchises synonymous with success and domination in their sports. Pitino came to reclaim that heritage in the name of Red Auerbach, Bill Russell, Bob Cousy, Tom Heinsohn and Larry Bird.

He leaves, richer by the $28 million he was paid the last four seasons while leaving the remainder of his $50 million 10-year deal, though poorer for having allowed the legacy and reputation of the Celtics to sink even lower on his watch.

"It has been a great privilege to coach the greatest basketball tradition in sports," Pitino said in a statement Monday. "Top to bottom it is a first class franchise. Celtic legends have been a true inspiration to me. I wish we could have accomplished more between the lines."

Pitino never could, failing to make the playoffs. Matters only got worse this season with a team that clearly had tired of his constant threats to quit. Boston has lost six straight and 16-of-21 games since a 7-7 start. The Celtics, whom Pitino begged for defensive play, rank 26th in the NBA defensively, allowing 98.3 points per game.

Pitino, 48, is expected to be a candidate for a major college head coaching position. His longtime assistant, Jim O'Brien, takes over in Boston for the rest of the season. Former Celtics Dennis Johnson, Quinn Buckner, Rick Carlisle, Don Chaney and Paul Westphal, and St. John's coach Mike Jarvis, have been speculated about as potential successors. But there's also the likelihood owner Paul Gaston will sell the team and a group headed by Bird would come in to reshape the organization.

It has a storied past. Eight straight NBA championships from 1959 through 1966, 11 in 13 years from 1957 through 1969, two more in the 1970s, three more in the 1980s. During that span, the line of succession went from Bill Russell to Dave Cowens to Larry Bird. And all of them had one thing in common: Auerbach acquired them through trades and draft day gambles.

Cowens was the fourth pick in the draft and Bird the sixth. Russell was acquired through a trade for Ed Macauley and the rights to Cliff Hagen and by getting Rochester, with the No. 1 pick, to pass. Rochester additionally was granted the Ice Capades in their arena to offset basketball losses.

But once Auerbach's influence waned, so did the Celtics' on professional sports.

The Celtics haven't advance beyond the first round of the playoffs since the 1991-92 season. They haven't been to the conference finals for 13 years. Many of the NBA's top players today cannot recall the Celtics ever being a serious NBA contender. Kobe Bryant was 8 the last time the Celtics went to the NBA Finals.

Many trace the decline of the Celtics to the drug overdose death of Maryland star Len Bias in 1986. Bias had been the No. 2 pick in the NBA draft and the Celtics had perhaps their best team ever, their final championship team with Bird, Kevin McHale and Robert Parish. Bias was to be the star in the line of succession from Bird.

It again was Auerbach who manuevered to get Bias, having traded Gerald Henderson in 1984 to get the draft pick for him.

But Bias died and then, when developing star Reggie Lewis died of heart failure after the 1992-93 season after averaging more than 20 points for the second straight year, the Celtics tragically had lost two of the young stars they expected to lead them through the 1990s.

Those tragedies, however, account for the succession of management blunders that again leaves the team heading toward still another rebuilding.

Auerbach was phased out in the late 1980s and Dave Gavitt took over in 1990.

The first big mistake was the 1992 signing of former All-Star Xavier McDaniel. Once a feared competitor and scorer, McDaniel's knee problems had limited him severely by then. But the Celtics made the common mistake of imagining a star as he was, not as he is, and trying for a quick fix to remain competitive.

When that wasn't working, they compounded the mistake by signing another aging former star, Dominique Wilkins. He left after a troubled season for Europe. Then the Celtics invested big in European star Dino Radja, who never fit well and returned to Europe.

At the same time, the drafts, which once brought the likes of Bird, Cowens, Sam Jones, John Havlicek, McHale, Westphal and JoJo White, were coming up dry.

There was Dee Brown and Acie Earl with top 20 picks and Eric Montross with a top 10 pick.